The Lakota people have not, in their own understanding, received anything in exchange for the Black Hills.

The money is there, waiting, acknowledging the wrong — but the wrong, in their understanding, is not one that money can right.

The existence of the fund also reframes the question of whether the Sioux position is a principled stand or an impractical one.

The impracticality argument rests on the claim that holding out for land return is futile, because Congress will not act.

The principled stand argument rests on the claim that accepting money as a substitute for the return of what was taken wrongfully would ratify the wrong.

Both of these things can be true simultaneously.